Phantom Pains
by PutMoneyInThyPurse
Summary: Three amputees wake in the night.


Note: The start of this is quite shamelessly inspired by, if not actually stolen from, Le'letha's scene with Drago at the start of _Stormfall_ (and if you don't know what that is, OMG GO READ IT BUT READ her _Nightfall_ FIRST).

* * *

Drago Bludvist wakes with a scream.

His arm is burning. It hasn't been there for over twenty years, but it's burning.

He roars with rage and frustration and, yes, pain. How can a missing limb still hurt? Some stupid healer said something about the remaining flesh still recalling how it was cut off. Whatever the reason, it's woken him from sleep with vivid dreams about the ones who died, the ones he loved. When there still was love.

Drago brings his big hand around to cup his stump, trying to chase away the pain in his non-existent arm with an actual touch. It helps. He pushes his fingers into the smooth place where an arm used to be. He will make it so no-one has to suffer this again, he reminds himself.

Still, it takes him a long time to get back to sleep.

* * *

Hiccup wakes with a scream.

Before he can draw breath for another, Toothless is wrapped around him. His friend isn't nuzzling or purring – he's _intent,_ already undoing the straps of Hiccup's prosthetic with his teeth.

The pain tonight is one of the worst. Hiccup can't say a word to reassure Toothless; he can only gasp and clench his fists around the sides of the bed and pray relief comes quickly. His leg isn't there, but it's burning.

Toothless wraps his toothless gums around Hiccup's stump and licks it before taking it in his mouth, purring. The immediate touch of Toothless' tongue and gums forces his nerves to acknowledge what's _here,_ not reach out in excruciating tendrils in search of a part of him that isn't there anymore. Hiccup moans with relief as the pain drains away all at once. "Thanks… bud. You're amazing…" he pants, voice still ragged.

As Hiccup shudders with remembered pain and breathes and runs a hand over Toothless' head, Toothless purrs loudly and deliberately, calming nerve and muscle, pressing close. Hiccup is so grateful he thinks he might cry, although he knows Toothless' only reward is helping him. He's good at it, too. After so long, his amazing friend knows what to do. He's known what to do ever since he learned, through trial and error, how to deal with Hiccup's stump acting up. ('Acting up' is a pretty dignified Viking way to describe it, Hiccup thinks. It was Gobber who first used the phrase on his own prosthetic.) Hiccup doesn't know how he'd get through these nights without him.

He falls asleep before he can say _I love you, Toothless,_ but the dragon knows it just the same.

* * *

Toothless wakes with a scream.

Before he can work out what's wrong, he has an armful of Hiccup, petting and whispering and trailing bedclothes. "What's wrong, bud? You okay? Bad dream? What is it?"

His heart swells with warmth and he wraps a foreleg around Hiccup, crooning, before a shriek is forced out of him from a pain in the tailfin that isn't there.

From the direction of Hiccup's gaze, his friend has figured it out as well. He meets Toothless' eyes. "That happen often?" he asks evenly, eyes dark.

Quite truthfully, Toothless shakes his head no. It's happened a handful of times in five years, and he has no idea why it's 'acted up', as Hiccup calls his own similar moments, now.

"Here." Hiccup takes the end of Toothless' tail in both hands, quickly undoing the straps that hold the prosthetic in place. He rubs and massages the circulation back into Toothless' tail and his soft hands squeeze the part below the tailfins. The sensation helps give Toothless something to focus on and the blazing pain fades a little.

He's been so wrapped up in Hiccup's ministrations that he hasn't realized that Hiccup has brought the tail around to his face. "Try licking it." His friend's voice is a caress. "Let me know if it helps."

It feels special, Hiccup holding up Toothless' tail to offer it to his tongue. Toothless licks it hesitantly, then more surely. Hiccup strokes it with his hands as Toothless keeps licking. The pain melts away.

Hiccup feels it when Toothless relaxes. He's settled inside Toothless' wings, pressed against his stomach. "That's it, bud. Atta boy. That's it," he keeps murmuring, still holding his tail, humming in his throat like a purr. Toothless relaxes against his smaller friend, still licking the scar, as Hiccup's warm weight fills his heart and his words of comfort and encouragement give him strength. His friend's hands never stop stroking and caressing his maimed tail, and at some point, Hiccup presses his lips to the place where the missing fin used to be, and lays his face against it, soothing and loving it and whispering apologies.

They become horizontal and tangled up in each other at some point, but neither of them minds.


End file.
